Jump to content

Mothra (star)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Image of Mothra within MACS J0416.1-2403

Mothra, or EMO J041608.838-240358.60, is a binary system with a possible transient[clarification needed], in the constellation of Eridanus. Mothra is in the galaxy cluster MACS J0416.1-2403, nicknamed the "Christmas Tree Galaxy Cluster".[1]

Distance and galaxy

[edit]

Mothra is one of the most distant known stars; it is 5.4 gigaparsecs (17.6 billion light years) away. They had to magnify to a factor of 4,000 to find EMO J041608.838-240358.60. EMO stands for extremely magnified object. LS1 is the host galaxy of the EMO J041608.838-240358.60 system, a dwarf galaxy or globular cluster with a mass of 10,000-1,000,000 solar masses.[2]

Physical properties

[edit]

Mothra consists of two supergiant stars, a yellow supergiant and a blue supergiant. Mothra A is a yellow supergiant or yellow hypergiant. It has a size of 271 solar radii, based on a luminosity of 50,000 solar luminosities and a temperature of 5,250 kelvin. Mothra A has an initial mass of 15 solar masses. Mothra B is the blue supergiant. It has an size of 95.5 solar radii based on a luminosity of 125,000 solar luminosities and a temperature of 14,000 kelvin. The orbital characteristics of the binary system is currently unknown. Mothra A had a possible transient event, for 120-230 days it swelled up to 3,000 solar radii, and cooled down to 4,000 kelvin.[2][3]

See also

[edit]

References

[edit]
  1. ^ "NASA's Webb, Hubble Combine to Create Most Colorful View of Universe - NASA". November 9, 2023.
  2. ^ a b [1] [dead link]
  3. ^ "JWST's PEARLS: Mothra, a new kaiju star at z = 2.091 extremely magnified by MACS0416, and implications for dark matter models" (PDF).